Hide and Secrets

by Sophie McKenzie

  Alan – Sandy Williams called @ 3 p.m.

  Did Dad get the message? Did he call back? The name means nothing to me. Anyway, Sandy Williams is probably just an ordinary customer – nothing to do with Dad’s disappearance.

  I shove the boxes roughly back into place and trudge away, feeling hopeless.

  Where on earth do I look now?

  6

  I wake up late the next morning. It took me ages to get to sleep and, even then, I kept waking up and tossing and turning. I open my curtains wide to find a cloudy sky outside. The damp, hot air presses down on my head, Rik’s warning humming in my ears:

  Find your dad and warn him, before it’s too late.

  I drag on leggings and a homemade tunic made from soft blue cotton. The photo of Dad, Bess and me on the beach that I took from the office keeps catching my eye. We were so happy that day, it hurts to remember it.

  I force myself to go downstairs. I can hear Mum tapping away in her office. She usually spends the early morning replying to emails, working on her social media and her Truth in the Stars newsletter. Mrs Trimble is humming to herself in the living room.

  I wonder idly where Bess is. On weekdays during term time a tutor comes to the house every morning – Bess hasn’t been to proper school since she stopped speaking – and she sees a therapist on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.

  However, it’s the summer holidays now and the therapist is only coming once a week. Left to her own devices, Bess normally follows Mrs Trimble – or me – around the house, curled up wherever we are with her tongue poking out from between lips as she concentrates on her latest drawing.

  I trudge out on to the patio. Bess is at the opposite end of the garden, close to the big oak tree. She’s standing with her hands on her hips, her little legs sticking out of her dungarees. They’re an old pair of mine and too big for her. She’s rolled up the legs and the left hangs lower than the right. She’s also tried to plait her hair herself so the braids are uneven too. Next to the huge tree trunk, she looks small and vulnerable as she shuffles from side to side. What is she looking at?

  Curious, I wander towards her. Which is when Tyler emerges from behind the oak tree. His long arms are stretched into the air, one leg pointing in front of him. There’s a look of intense concentration on his face as he balances himself, then throws himself forward into a cartwheel.

  His hands plant firmly. One. Two. His straight legs turn in a perfect circle over his body. He lands lightly on the grass, pauses for just a fraction of a second, then cartwheels again across the lawn.

  This time he stands up, grinning at Bess. His smile lights up his whole face. Bess claps her hands, jumping up and down with excitement.

  Neither of them have noticed me.

  ‘Your turn, Bess!’ Tyler calls. ‘Come here!’

  My jaw drops as Bess runs over. Tyler talks to her – words I can’t hear – as he gestures towards her arms and legs.

  Bess is nodding, reaching her arms into the air.

  ‘No!’ I shout. Is he insane? Bess is too small to attempt a cartwheel. ‘Stop!’

  Bess freezes. Tyler looks up. He sees me and that gorgeous smile disappears.

  ‘Come on, Bess,’ he calls, his eyes still on me. ‘There’s nothing to be afraid of.’

  Bess hesitates. I can see the fear in her whole body. She’s just doing this to please him. To try to impress him.

  Fury rises inside me as I break into a run. ‘Stop!’ I yell again. ‘It’s not safe.’ I reach Bess with my next stride and grab her arm. ‘You might break your neck.’ I spin her round.

  She gazes up at me, her face scarlet with humiliation, her dark eyes defiant. Then she wrenches herself out of my grip and races across the grass, into the house. I turn back to Tyler. He’s staring angrily at me, arms folded across his chest.

  ‘You should be ashamed of yourself!’ I shout.

  ‘What?’ Tyler’s mouth gapes. ‘What the hell is your problem?’

  ‘Me?’ Anger roils inside me. ‘You’re the one encouraging a vulnerable little girl who isn’t even seven years old to—’

  ‘To attempt a cartwheel? With me right there to help her?’ Tyler’s eyes widen. ‘You’re being ridiculous.’

  ‘And you’re being irresponsible,’ I snap back. ‘You don’t know anything about my sister. Or me.’

  Tyler’s jaw grinds, the muscles moving under the skin. ‘I know you’re stuck-up,’ he says, his eyes narrowing. ‘I know you’re the rudest person I’ve ever met.’

  We stare at each other. And, suddenly, I know that if I stay here a second longer, I’m going to burst into tears. I turn and run, pelting around the side of the house, across the drive at the front and along the dirt track. I don’t stop until I’m in the woods. Then I fall to a heap on the dry earth, hot tears streaming down my face.

  I cry so much my heart feels like it will burst. Dad is out there somewhere and I have no idea how to find him. There are horrible strangers in our home and now Bess hates me too.

  Things couldn’t be worse.

  ‘Cat?’

  I look up. Tyler is standing over me, arms folded and a look of concern on his face. He followed me? How embarrassing. I turn away, wiping the snot and tears from my face.

  Tyler squats down beside me. ‘Are you okay?’ He touches my arm, just for a second.

  My skin tingles.

  I shake my head. ‘Everything’s wrong.’ The words flow out on a sob. I swallow furiously, determined not to cry in front of him.

  Tyler settles himself on to the patch of earth beside me. We’re close to the stream now, the water bubbles gently and the leaves over our head rustle. I sniff loudly, then wipe my face again. I look up. Tyler is watching me, his eyes full of concern. Slivers of sunlight play across his face, gleaming like emeralds in his eyes and catching the arc of his cheekbone and the square set of his jaw.

  I realize I’m staring and look away.

  ‘I didn’t mean to upset you,’ he says gently. ‘I get that you’re super-protective of your sister. I just thought that she spends all her time drawing, you know… shut up in her own head with the not-talking and… I thought she might like to try something new, have a bit of fun. I’m sorry if it scared you.’

  I tense, filling with surprise. I hadn’t expected an apology. Or for him to have understood Bess so quickly. I look up at him. There’s genuine warmth in his eyes. And suddenly I realize that I was in the wrong too.

  ‘No, I’m sorry,’ I say, offering him a shaky smile. ‘I overreacted. It’s fine to show Bess how to cartwheel, it’s just… she’s been through so much.’

  ‘You mean your dad?’ Tyler asks.

  I nod. ‘It was after that she stopped speaking,’ I explain, sitting back against a tree. Truth is, I was too caught up in my own, numb grief to notice exactly when Bess retreated into her drawings, answering all questions only with a nod or shake of the head, then backing away.

  ‘Our dog died too, just before Dad,’ I explain. ‘She was run over. Pirate belonged to all of us, but Bess played with her all the time. She was this amazing, crazy terrier with a brown patch over one eye, who never stopped racing around and jumping on everything. We all loved her,’ I pause, ‘but Bess loved her the most.’

  ‘That’s a lot,’ Tyler says, awkwardly. ‘For both of you.’

  I stare at him. ‘Yeah,’ I say.

  ‘I guess us being here doesn’t help.’ Tyler makes a face. ‘Dad was saying last night that it must be hard for you to have strangers living so on top of you.’ The corner of his mouth curls. ‘I told him it was hard for me too, though not that politely.’

  ‘You didn’t want to come here for the summer?’ This hadn’t occurred to me before. But now it seems obvious. Tyler is attractive and sophisticated. Everything that Brockledore – and my family – is not.

  ‘No way.’ Tyler rolls his eyes. ‘Back home there were friends and football and a proper internet connection. Here…’ he waves his hand. ‘Here it’s just trees an
d grass and… and bunny rabbits!’

  I laugh. Tyler gazes across to the stream.

  ‘Pretty, though.’ He looks at me. ‘So it’s not all bad.’ He shuffles back, so he’s leaning against a tree. He closes his eyes and holds his face up to the light filtering through the branches.

  ‘So are you really okay?’ he asks.

  A long moment passes. I stay silent. Most people I know would start speaking to fill the space, but Tyler just carries on leaning against his tree, eyes gently closed. Waiting.

  I clear my throat. ‘When’s your birthday?’

  Tyler opens his eyes, glancing at me in surprise. ‘Er, the twenty-ninth of April. Why?’

  So he’s a Taurus. I feel stupid for asking. Mum’s always so fascinated by people’s birth charts it’s easy to forget that most normal people don’t really think about their horoscopes.

  ‘Just wondering,’ I say, trying to cover my confusion while desperately looking for a new subject. ‘Er, where’s your mum?’

  ‘She got cancer and died when I was little.’ He stares at the stream in front of us.

  ‘Oh.’

  Too late I realize that just because I mentioned losing my dad, it doesn’t mean Tyler will want to talk about something so private and painful.

  ‘It’s always just been me and Dad,’ he says, softly. ‘That’s why I get what it’s like for Bess, all shut up in her own head.’

  ‘No brothers and sisters?’ I ask.

  Tyler shakes his head. ‘What about your dad? How long ago did he die?’

  Yesterday morning that would have been a straightforward question to answer. But now… I open my mouth to tell Tyler the phrases I’ve learned to use, the simple script that explains Dad drowned on a boat in a winter storm almost eighteen months ago, and that makes it clear I don’t want to be asked anything else. But when I speak, it’s not those words that come out.

  7

  A gentle breeze whooshes through the trees, the only sound around us. Maybe it’s the calm of the woods or maybe the concern in Tyler’s eyes, but once I’ve started speaking, I can’t stop:

  ‘Dad went out in his boat on his own and there was a storm and he didn’t come home,’ I say, my voice breathless and my explanation rushing out fast, like it’s got a will of its own. ‘Mum got more and more worried and then he was officially missing. We kept hoping and hoping and then after two days his boat washed up all battered along the coast and his things were inside, his wallet and his phone, waterlogged and ruined and that’s when we knew…’ I stop, drawing in a deep lungful of air. Tyler nods, his eyes intent on mine.

  ‘They declared him missing, presumed dead, but –’ I take a deep breath – ‘but yesterday one of Dad’s friends from work, Rik Adamski, got in touch. He told me Dad faked his death and is still alive and in hiding from gangsters who want to kill him in revenge for something he didn’t do.’ I stare at Tyler, my heart pounding.

  He stares back, his mouth gaping. ‘Whoa,’ he says. ‘What does your mum say?’

  I shrug. ‘Rik said she wouldn’t believe anything he said, and that I can’t tell the police because the gangsters would know.’ I can hear the bitterness creeping into my voice. ‘So I’m on my own.’

  ‘Are you’re sure what this Rik said is all true?’ Tyler asks. ‘It seems kind of unlikely, don’t you think?’

  ‘It does,’ I say, nodding. ‘But Rik knew all this stuff about me and Dad, and I’ve seen a picture of them together. They were friends. It’s just… Rik says he called me on a burner phone, and I don’t know when he’ll get in touch again, and the gangsters could get to Dad any time.’

  Tyler frowns. ‘Was your dad, like, a gang member, then? Running with bad people?’

  ‘No.’ I make a face. ‘Dad wasn’t like that. Rik told me they were set up. They’d identified this rare, priceless diamond which it turned out some gangsters had smuggled into the country. The diamond was stolen at some point and the boss of the gang – Fran Farmer – was convinced Rik and Dad did it.’ I shake my head. ‘I know it sounds crazy, like something out of a movie, but I’m sure it was real. I know Dad wouldn’t have left us unless he had to, and why would Rik lie about it anyway?’

  Tyler frowns. ‘So how much was this diamond worth?’

  I shake my head. ‘Millions, I think. There wasn’t time for Rik to explain everything. And now he’s gone and… and I’m on my own.’

  ‘No, you’re not.’ He grins and my stomach does a tiny somersault. Is he offering to help me?

  I look away, my emotions churning.

  Tyler takes out his phone. ‘First thing is to make sure this Rik is everything he said he is. Did you find out anything else about him? A wife… or a girlfriend?’ He looks at me expectantly.

  ‘Um,’ I say, ‘Rik said he didn’t have family, just an old aunt.’

  Tyler bends over his screen. I wipe my face. I didn’t put on any make-up this morning, so at least that won’t be smudging under my eyes, but I must look awful. I run my fingers through my hair too.

  A few minutes pass, then Tyler holds out his phone. ‘Was this him? It’s a guy called Rik Adamski from this area, who seems to have stopped posting seventeen months ago, around the time your dad died.’

  I take his phone and peer at the screen. Rik’s face stares back at me.

  ‘Yes,’ I say, my heart racing. ‘That’s him.’ I scroll down through the pictures. They are mostly selfies of Rik, either inside or outside what look like a variety of pubs.

  I come to a pic of Rik with his arm round the shoulders of an elderly lady. She’s wearing glasses and, like Rik, a warm smile. But it’s not the photo that’s caught my attention. It’s the caption:

  #HappyBirthday, Aunt Sandy – 70 years young! #oops #neveraskalady

  I stare at the name: Sandy. Dad’s handwritten Post-it flits into my head. I gasp, ‘I wonder if that’s Sandy Williams,’ I say, handing Tyler back his mobile. ‘Dad was supposed to call someone with that name the day before he disappeared.’

  ‘Okay, I’ll see if I can find a post with her surname.’ Tyler taps away.

  ‘And I’ll look for Sandy Williams’s contact details.’ I take out my own mobile and open a search. It’s soon obvious there are hundreds of people called Sandy Williams and I set my phone down with a sigh.

  Tyler is still scrolling down Rik’s Instagram feed. I watch him, liking the way his forehead creases slightly as he concentrates.

  ‘Any luck?’ I say.

  ‘Not on the surname,’ Tyler says, ‘but look…’ He hands me his phone again.

  I gaze down at the screen. It’s another photo from Aunt Sandy’s birthday, with Sandy herself in the middle of a group of elderly ladies. The caption reads:

  #Sandybirthdaystreetparty

  ‘There.’ Tyler points to the far end of the picture. A road sign is just visible to the left of the group. It shows the letters: Thresha—

  I stare at him. ‘Do you think that’s where she lives?’

  ‘It must be.’ Tyler nods. ‘It’s her party.’

  I turn back to my phone and refine my search. A bird screeches overhead, breaking the silence.

  ‘I’ve found her!’ I say. I show Tyler another series of pictures, this time showing Sandy and her friends outside a front door marked with the number 18.

  ‘Sandy Williams, 18 Thresham Street, Covington,’ I say out loud.

  ‘Nice work,’ Tyler says. He sounds impressed.

  ‘Why, thank you.’ I make my voice deliberately formal, hoping he won’t notice the blush that warms my cheeks.

  We hold each other’s gaze for a moment, then I look down at my screen again.

  ‘So… I’m thinking maybe Rik’s Aunt Sandy might have some clue about where Dad is,’ I say. ‘There’s no phone number to call her on, but Covington is just a few miles away.’

  ‘D’you want us to go over and visit her?’ Tyler asks.

  For a second I think I’ve misheard him. Did he say ‘us’?

  ‘I can go on
my own,’ I say quickly, then bite my lip. Did that sound rude? Tyler’s expression doesn’t change. ‘I… I just mean I can handle a visit to an old lady by myself.’

  ‘Course you can.’ Tyler smiles at me. ‘I just wondered if you fancied some company?’

  I shrug, feeling torn. On the one hand I don’t want Tyler to think I need his help – and I barely know him. On the other, I have to admit to liking the idea of spending time with him.

  I like the idea a lot.

  ‘I really don’t mind either way,’ Tyler says quickly, stretching out his legs. ‘It’s just that there’s not much else to do around here.’

  Oh. So Tyler only wants to come because he’s bored. I sigh, inwardly. I should have realized. Why would he be interested in someone like me? He’s handsome and full of London smarts and probably has a million mates back home, while I’m short and friendless, with horrible clumpy hair and homemade clothes that I might like but that probably look super-unfashionable to him.

  At least he’s offering to help. Maybe, in time, we can be friends.

  I smile at him. ‘Sure,’ I say. ‘We can go together.’

  Friends is enough.

  It’s more than enough, in fact.

  I stand up, brushing bits of grass and earth off my tunic. Now that we have a plan, my heart is beating faster.

  I’m on Dad’s trail at last.

  ‘The bus to Covington leaves from Brockledore Village,’ I explain, checking the time. ‘If we hurry we should make it.’

  ‘Great,’ Tyler says, jumping to his feet. ‘Let’s go.’

  8

  Tyler and I rush to the village, only to find that the bus is running late. We wait at the stop opposite the war memorial. The sun has burned away the earlier clouds and it’s a beautiful day, with clear skies and a light breeze. Tyler leans against a tree, peering at his phone.

  I, on the other hand, can’t stand still.

  This time yesterday I was lazing about with Bess, thinking about the vintage dress I was making and getting irritated by Mum. Dad was a sad memory, always there at the back of my mind, but not real, not whole. An absence, not a presence.